‘It’s held!’ someone shouted.
‘Quiet!’ roared Gorm, holding up the sword Raith used to carry.
As if that was a signal there was a cracking bang, men cringing as dust and chunks of stone flew from the back of Gudrun’s Tower, a rock big as a man’s head bouncing across the yard and hammering against the wooden wall near Raith.
There was an almighty groaning and the ivy that covered the tower seemed to twist, cracks shooting through the stonework, the roof leaning sideways, birds showering up into the sky.
‘Gods,’ whispered Raith, his jaw dropping. With awful slowness the whole tower began to fold in on itself.
‘Get down!’ bellowed Blue Jenner, hauling Raith onto the walkway beside him.
It sounded as if the whole world was shaking itself apart. Raith squeezed his eyes shut, stones pattering on his back like hail. He was ready to die. Just wished he’d died with Skara.
He opened his eyes but all was murk. A ship in fog.
Something plucked at him and he slapped it clumsily away.
He saw Blue Jenner’s lined face, all pale, all ghostly, shouting something but Raith couldn’t hear him. His ears were ringing.
He dragged himself up by the parapet, coughing as he stared into the man-made fog. He could see the faint shape of the elf-built tower on the left, of the elf-built wall on the right, but in between, where Gudrun’s Tower had stood, there was only a great gap. A broken mass of boulders and shattered beams, the yard between it and the wooden wall littered with rubble.
‘Least it fell outwards,’ he muttered, but he couldn’t even hear his own voice.
He realized he’d left the fine helmet he took from that ship’s captain outside Skara’s door, but there was no going back for it. He’d just have to ask nicely that no one hit his head. Such a fool’s notion he nearly laughed.
Then he saw shapes in the gloom. Shadows of men. The High King’s warriors, clambering over the fallen ruins and through the breach. Dozens of them, painted shields turned dusty grey, swords and axes dulled in the gloom, mouths yawning in silent war-cries. Hundreds of them.
Arrows flitted into that heaving mass of men. From the crescent of defenders, from the elf-walls high above. Arrows came from all around them, and struggling over that broken rubble they couldn’t have formed a decent shield-wall if they’d wanted. Men fell in the yard, fell among the boulders, crawled, and rolled and sat down staring. He saw a big old warrior shambling on with four or five shafts lodged in his mail. He saw a red-haired man who’d got his boot wedged between two rocks tear off his helmet and fling it away in frustration. He saw a warrior with golden armrings limping along using his sword like a crutch.
They kept coming, battle-cries a faint burble over the ringing in Raith’s ears, surging to the foot of the wooden wall. They kept coming, as men above stabbed with spears, flung rocks down, leant out to hack with axes. They kept coming, some kneeling with shields above their heads as steps while others clawed their way up the timbers of the makeshift wall. Would’ve been bravery to admire if it hadn’t all been bent on getting Raith killed.
He shut his eyes, wedged that battered old peg in his jaws, but no battle-joy surged up now. Used to be Raith had a thirst for violence felt like it’d never be satisfied. Seemed he’d finally drunk his fill, but Mother War kept on pouring. He thought of Skara looking down. Thought of her laugh. To hear that one more time seemed something worth fighting for. He forced his eyes open.
The High King’s warriors were swarming over the wall, half the walkway seething with struggling men. One was lifting his sword to chop at Jenner and Raith hit him on the side of the head with his axe, left a great dent in his helmet and sent him sprawling. A hand clutched at the parapet and Raith hacked it in half, punched a man in the mouth with the rim of his shield and flung him back, dagger spinning from his fingers as he tumbled off the wall.
He saw Jenner’s eyes go wide, spun around to see a big Lowlander bearing down on him, a great axe held in both fists and the One God’s seven-rayed sun bouncing on a thong around his neck. Sometimes the best thing you can do with danger is run straight at it. Raith dived at him, the axe-haft catching on his shoulder and the blade just grazing his back, jarring from the Lowlander’s hands and clattering into the yard below.
They grappled, waddled, clawing and spitting at each other. Raith dropped his axe, forced his burned arm down, fumbling for the grip of his knife. The Lowlander butted at him, caught him in the jaw, made enough room to bring his fist back for a punch, but enough for Raith to jerk his knife free too.